


Life of Lepidoptra

by tkp (lettered)



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-03
Updated: 2008-06-03
Packaged: 2017-10-10 01:49:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/93880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lettered/pseuds/tkp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>seraphcelene's prompt: use <i>rabble of butterflies</i> somewhere in the text.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Life of Lepidoptra

She is a vassal to fear. The only life down here akin to the bright, wild life she's known is the fluttering in her stomach.

But underground the dead, the souls of dear departed, flock around her still-wild life. An alien star is she, a wildflower, to their lives that died. A ragtag team they are, a rabble of butterflies—blighted, albino; moths flap for the light.

She is their vessel of life. A womb in this tomb for youth/innocence they can't remember. Meanwhile, surface-side, she is a vessel of dark, shadow and unlit corners, white underbellies. She's a black hole of worldly knowing, not to be approached lest she youth/ignorance suck down, besmirch. Their trembling is genuflection.

Everywhere she goes, she's the one who knows, she tells him, what the Other holds.

She is queen.

"Madam Butterfly," he says, because he knows history that hasn't been written yet and loves to tease her for it.

"I will be," she seethes, because she knows he wishes she wished to stay and loves to torture him with it. "Just as soon as I emerge from this cocoon of Hell."

"Shall you?" He smiles.

"Until I'm caught again, smothered in your silk, buried underground!" (He gave her the raiment of royalty to wear; pupae are sometimes hidden by the earth.)

"Are you sure you're in the pupa?" He looks down at her. "Consider your propensity to over-eat."

"How dare you." Her eyes narrow. "Call me a pig."

"Oh, no. A caterpillar," he says lightly. "I'm speaking of your propensity towards curiosity, of course. You always did have to know what everything tasted like. You always did have to know everything." His voice goes sensual. "Even the forbidden."

Three times six months ago he spoke in that same sinuous voice, tempting her to taste the feast he'd laid out on the table. The arm that offered her the pomegranate had looked to her like a serpent.

"In the world of the alive," she emphasizes, "I am not your wife."

"Not Puccini, then." He shakes his head. "Or if it is, you shall take the part of Pinkerton, and I of poor Butterfly."

"I don't know what you're talking about!" She stamps her foot. "You mock me."

"Only trying to return your favors." But his voice is serious. "You're free here, you know."

"Some consolation, when I've been brought so low!"

"Yes, your highness." He's being sarcastic again. "Only, has it ever occurred to you the world above could be a chrysalis? Come now, you never once felt smothered?"

"Of course not!" She almost laughs in his face. "My moth—"

"I'm sorry," he says smoothly, turning to leave, "I meant to say 'mothered'."

She had not been starving when she ate those eighteen months ago. There was honey, berries, seeds surface-side aplenty, so much she ached with repletion. Sometimes though she wondered whether that swollen ache in her lower half was starving after all, for something new.

So much that when his voice insinuated in her ear, and he offered her the fruit, she planted his seeds inside her, and wondered what it would be to be filled of serpents, too.

"If only you hadn't pulled me down," she laments so often.

"My dear," sometimes sardonic, sometimes gentle, "are you sure you didn't fall?"


End file.
